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 Thailand on Thursday revoked an emergency decree aimed at ending months of protests against the government and monarchy that had only inflamed anger and brought tens of thousands of people onto Bangkok streets. A government statement published in the official Royal Gazette said it would end measures that included bans on political gatherings of five or more people and publishing news that could affect security. "The current violent situation that led to the announcement of the severe situation has eased and ended to a situation in which government officials and state agencies can enforce the regular laws," the statement said. The only specific incident given for the ban was one in which Queen Suthida's convoy was jeered by protesters, but it came after protests that are the biggest challenge in years to Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha and King Maha Vajiralongkorn. Protesters, who have given Prayuth a three-day deadline to quit, said withdrawing the measures was not enough. "He's still seeking to stay in power while ignoring all the people's demands. The emergency decree shouldn't have been issued in the first place," Sirawith "Ja New" Seritiwat, one of the leaders, said.
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 Hopes of ending nearly a month of bloodshed in the mountain enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh looked slim on Thursday as Azeri and ethnic Armenian forces fought new battles on the eve of talks in Washington. Plans for U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to meet the foreign ministers of Azerbaijan and Armenia on Friday raised hopes this week that the two former Soviet republics would agree to end their deadliest fighting since the mid-1990s. Hundreds of people have been killed since fighting flared on Sept. 27, raising fears of a wider war drawing in Turkey and Russia and increasing concern about the security of pipelines in Azerbaijan that carry Azeri gas and oil to world markets.
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 Joe Biden denied that his family has profited from his public offices, appearing to contradict a statement his son Hunter Biden made last year in which he said he thinks he would "probably not" have been asked to be on the board of a Ukrainian energy company if he were not Biden's son.In an interview published Wednesday, the Democratic presidential nominee was asked about Republican Senator Ron Johnson's claim that Hunter Biden along with other Biden family members profited off the family name, an accusation that has become a frequent attack line by the Trump campaign less than two weeks out from the election."Is there any legitimacy to Senator Johnson's claim?" WISN 12 News's Adrienne Pedersen asked Biden."None whatsoever," Biden responded, calling the accusations "garbage" promoted by "Trump's henchman," Rudy Guiliani."It's a last-ditch effort in his desperate campaign to smear me and my family," Biden continued, citing Senator Mitt Romney in the former vice president's argument that "there's no basis to this."Romney serves on the Senate Homeland Security committee, which Johnson chairs, and in September criticized the committee's probe of Hunter Biden's business dealings, saying it is "not the legitimate role of government or Congress … to be used in an effort to damage political opponents.""And the vast majority of the intelligence people have come out and said there's no basis at all," Biden added. "Ron should be ashamed of himself."Last week, the New York Post reported on le
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